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MIRPUR (AJK): Sep 14 (APP): Veteran Kashmiri rights activist and APHC leader Altaf Hussain Wani has urged the UN Human Rights Council to take effective cognisance of the colonial-era tactics India’s repressive regime led by Modi has been employing to subjugate Kashmiri people in the Indian-held territory of Jammu and Kashmir.
Taking part in a general debate held under Item 2 at the ongoing 54th session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva on Thursday, Altaf Wani, while speaking on behalf of the World Muslim Congress, said that India has been using its military might to suppress the legitimate aspirations of the people of Kashmir says a message, reaching and released to the media here on Thursday.
Highlighting the devastating impact of the continued military occupation, he said that the deadly conflict has consumed nearly a hundred thousand lives during the past 34 years.
The repressive policies the Indian government has been employing to crush every kind of dissent in the region, the WMC representative said that the people in Kashmir face sedition charges and were booked under UAPA, PSA and other draconian laws for merely asking for their rights to self-determination to determine their political future.
He said that essential fundamental freedoms, including the right to freedom of speech and opinion, the right to protest and peaceful assembly remain largely suppressed.
The media, he said, has been completely silenced in the region.
Referring to a news story published by the BBC recently, Wani said that the story published under the headline “Any story could be the last-India’s crackdown on the Kashmir press”, lists a sinister and systematic campaign to intimidate and silence the local press in Kashmir.
Referring to India’s policy of deceit and deception, Wani said that India was using every international platform to mislead the global community and hide the crimes its forces have been committing against humanity in Kashmir.
Urging the council to revisit its understanding of the situation in Kashmir, he said that it was high time that the office of the high commissioner must ponder on reports, press releases, joint letters and communications on Kashmir by the special rapporteurs and leading human rights organizations.
Wani said that if everything was normal in Kashmir, then why doesn’t India allow the UN fact-finding mission to visit occupied Kashmir as recommended by the OHCHR report released in 2018?
He said that it was high time that the council and high commissioner should take a bold stand and released a full report on the situation in the Indian-occupied territory of Jammu and Kashmir.